


By a Thread

by LunaDeSangre



Series: The Way You Fall Asleep [10]
Category: Chicago Fire
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Disturbing Themes, Established Relationship, Implied Light Dom/Sub, M/M, Possibly Triggering, S3E23: Spartacus, S4E01: Let It Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-18
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-05-24 22:39:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14963531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunaDeSangre/pseuds/LunaDeSangre
Summary: Matt wants Kelly to be safe. It's all he wants.But Kelly? Kelly wasin the way.





	By a Thread

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sure every writer has something they work on when they feel like crap, and use to experiment weird writing styles with. This has been mine for a little bit over a year now (before I seriously started writing in this fandom—the aftermath of that episode was such a let-down that my brain wouldn't shut up about it).  
> The blame for this thing (besides the frustration caused by that episode), mainly goes, weirdly enough, to that one episode of _Starsky and Hutch_ where Hutch is kidnapped for information about a girl. (And to probably a few too many episodes of _Criminal Minds_ as well.)  
>  I'm sure the-Nesbitt-case-going-even-worse must have been done a few times already at least, but I needed to tackle it in this universe anyway, and I couldn't stop thinking that Kelly's relationship with Matt would complicate things for Nesbitt. (Like Matt actually going to Molly's _with_ Kelly that night, for example, while Katya knocked on the door with him and his goon on her tail.)
> 
> Also: when I click that _choose not to use archive warnings_ box, be leery of the contents.

Afterwards, when he needs to make sense of it—to _tell_ , no matter how much he doesn't want to—the whole thing ends up as something very much like a particularly terrible nightmare permanently stuck in his head: horrifically muddled and all jumbled, most of it almost entirely blurry, save for those few moments that are terrifyingly clear. Those moments that he wishes he could just forget, but _can't_ , because _he remembers_.

He remembers waking up groggy, confused and _completely_ disorientated, not sure if he's blind or blindfolded, and realizing slowly, with abysmal horror, that he's tied up, in an awkward ankles-to-wrists position that gives him absolutely _no_ leeway, that his mouth is taped shut (which is not helping the helpless panic he can feel building—he might asphyxiate if he starts hyperventilating), and that it's definitely tape on his eyes too, with the way it's pulling on his skin as he tries to get free. Fruitlessly.

He has to _force_ himself to think, through the terror, the nausea and the pain in his head, and comes up with: _car trunk_ —recognizing the lurches and the sounds at the same time as he remembers how and _why_.

Fucking Nesbitt. Matt _knew_ he should have lunged for the kitchen knife. Lunged for it and used it, even if it meant becoming a murderer, because Katya is dead and Antonio said they'd be safe and he's _not_ and she's _dead_ and that fucking bastard's _shot his lover_ , and Kelly can't die, he can't, he really _can't_ , but he might have, might be dead, because Matt didn't even manage to pack the wound in his stomach properly before they grabbed him away and that bullet to his head had _looked_ like a graze and he had a pulse but he wasn't conscious and there was _so much blood_ and if he's dead—he can't be because then—but if he's _dead_ —

The car stops abruptly and Matt holds his breath, wondering if he should try screaming through the tape, because he can't hear any traffic noises, any indication there's anyone around besides whoever's in the car (Nesbitt and his goon, he guesses), and the only thing he can do with the way he's tied up is _shuffle helplessly_.

He tries anyway when the trunk opens, because what the fuck _else_ can he _do?_

Nesbitt _laughs_. Matt would recognize that voice anywhere now; he's sure he'll have nightmares about it if he's ever able to sleep again: Katya's dead eyes, Kelly going down— _all that blood_ —and Nesbitt laughing and Matt tied up and blind, unable to do _anything_.

He shuts down everything and _screams_ , as much as his lungs and the fucking tape let him, and pants through his nose, trying _not_ to pass out, muscles seizing as he automatically tries to get free again. Numbly, he thinks he's probably never hated anyone in his life as much as he hates this fucking sorry excuse of an human being right now.

He remembers at first, it's only chloroform. Or he thinks that was chloroform; it's not like he'd known what that stuff smelled like before he was forced to breathe it in as he fought to get to his lover _bleeding out on the floor_. But anyway, something presses against his nose again, cotton or a rag of some kind (he's not sure this time either), wet with what can only be chloroform _again_ , and like the last time Matt tries to hold his breath, shaking his head in a desperate, terrified attempt to escape or delay or _something_ , but he's tied and pinned down and eventually his lungs hurt too badly and survival reflexes take over. _Again_.

 _NopleaseKelly_ is his last conscious thought. He thinks that was his last conscious thought the first time around too.

The heavier stuff comes later. When he's tied to a chair (a cold metal chair that makes him shiver), and the tape on his mouth is off but not the one on his eyes, and they keep circling him and punching him and asking him questions. Well, one question, but it's difficult to answer a question you don't understand, especially when your ears are ringing and your stomach is trying to crawl out of your mouth (or out of your nose?) and your brain keeps looping deceptively-silent gunshots and _too much blood_ behind your eyelids. What notebook?

Katya? You killed Katya. You killed her.

Kelly, Kelly can't be dead. He can't be dead. Oh please he can't be dead, Kelly, oh please Kelly, Kelly please, KellyKellyKelly—

He remembers they slap him a lot, when they prick him and the pain becomes a cloud, a fluffy cotton-candy cloud running through his veins and making him float, after all the punches and the burning slashes on his thigh. (His right thigh. He thinks. Right is not left, right? Left is where his heart is…is it still beating? He's too fluffy to feel anything.)

Notebook? He has a notepad, but Kelly keeps stealing it to doodle cats with long curling tails and little happy clouds with pirate boats hats and squiggly Celtic knots in all the corners and oh god Kellynoplease—

Matt doesn't like being slapped, but who cares except Kelly—

The tape on his eyes is torn off in one violent motion that makes him scream wordlessly.

" _Katya's fucking notebook_ ," Ugly Goon growls right in his face.

 _You stink_ , Matt thinks, and _Do I still have eyelashes?_

Ugly Goon grabs his throat and shakes him viciously, and Matt's teeth rattle along with the chair. "I'll pluck your fucking _eyes_ out if you don't fucking answer me!"

He shakes him more, and Matt can't breathe.

He remembers Nesbitt's face in front of him, too close, and that the bastard has the fucking gall to actually look _worried_.

"Matt," he says, "Matt." Like they're _friends_ or something. "Matt, give him what he wants. Just give him what he wants."

 _And what_ , Matt thinks, _you'll let me go?_ And he's laughing and coughing and choking until everything darkens and collapses sideways.

He remembers being cold and thirsty and _burning_ , sweat dripping off his face, his throat, everywhere. Or is it blood?

Might be tears, too. But tears only come from eyes, right?

Eyes have eyelashes.

Does he still have eyelashes? It must be so weird not to have eyelashes. Kelly has nice eyelashes. Kelly likes his eyelashes. Kelly doesn't like to see him cry.

Is he crying? He _can't_. It makes Kelly sad. He doesn't like to make Kelly sad.

Can you be sad when you're dead?

"You'll find out soon if you don't tell me where that fucking notebook is," Ugly Goon says, calmly, evenly.

And then he digs his fingers into the slashes on Matt's thigh, deep, deep and deeper, grabbing and holding on _inside_ when Matt tries to wriggle away even though he _can't_ , tied and trapped and _pinned there_ , and Matt screams and screams and _screams_.

Ugly Goon just sits there with his fingers _in_ , and _grins_.

He remembers waking up, several times, always still in that chair. Cold, thirsty, burning, hurting everywhere. Sometimes fluffy, sometimes dreadfully hyperaware of every slight ache, every slight movement around him, every breath near him, always too damn close.

Sometimes he can see, sometimes he can't.

Sometimes he can't even think, but they ask him things anyway. He can't remember if he ever answers.

He never seems to remember passing out either.

"How's our little firefighter?" a voice says, disgustingly amused and _vicious_ , brutal fingers yanking up his head by his hair. "Still _fighting_?"

He hurts and shakes and trembles and _leaks_ —blood, tears, sweat, he doesn't know—and he can't _see_ , but he can _feel_. And he _hurts_ , he hurts so much, everywhere, and his throat burns and _throbs_ —but he can still scream.

He doesn't know if that's good or not, but it drowns out that horrible laughter.

He remembers darkness so complete, so filled with _nothingness_ it chokes him, crawls into him, makes him dizzy and lurching and spinning even as he stays blind and still, paralyzed by unnamable things. He remembers mutely screaming into it, incapable of thought, the only sound his own struggling breaths.

Loud strangled breathing, gasping in the light burning his eyes. Hands around his throat, squeezing and shaking and squeezing, and horribly, horrifyingly gentle. Hot breath against his ear, speaking incomprehensible words, and fingers in his hair roughly tugging his face up and the light burning his eyes. Shivering in cold, exhausted terror, the pain a dull, unending thing, like another sense or some kind of full-body appendage, thinking of nothing but _the light burning his eyes_.

He remembers _Katya's_ dead eyes staring at him, too, one stray strand of hair in her too pale face, like she'd just fallen like that, like she'd just died from the bullet wound in her stomach. Remembers the path of her blood on the floor said otherwise. As did her clothes.

Matt had liked her. Respected her. She'd liked him too, differently and much more than she should have, had hit on him, subtly, until he finally caught on and told her, gentle and a bit embarrassed, both by her attentions and his own obliviousness: _I have a lover_.

 _Of course_ , she'd said, with a nod, a little upward curl of her lips. And: _She's a lucky woman, your lover._

 _Man_ , he'd said. _But I'm the one who's lucky. He's amazing_ , he'd added, impulsively, because, well, that's always been the best word to describe Kelly.

She'd smiled. _A lucky man_ , she'd amended, and it hadn't been clear whether she'd meant Kelly or him, but he hadn't asked, because he'd had a feeling she'd done it on purpose.

He doesn't feel very lucky, tied to that chair, head pounding and throbbing and echoing and _splitting_ , his heart battering inside his chest, like a wild feral thing trying to escape its prison of flesh and bones. Not knowing if his lover is alive—hoping with each loud, painful thump: _a lucky man_. Please. _Please_.

He can't afford to concentrate on anything else: if his mind slips to how Katya must have died—to how _he's_ probably going to die, he might sink into complete insanity.

He remembers wishing he _didn't_ remember Antonio's words about _trafficking girls_.

"It's a lucrative business," Ugly Goon says, conversationally, "there's always needs for fresh ones. Of course, a lot of them have to be—what's the word? Ah, yes. Broken in, first. Not everyone likes their girls feisty." He waves his hands as he talks, and with it that great hunting knife of his, slick with Matt's own blood.

Matt doesn't care about the knife anymore. Still. Yet? He doesn't know when that is.

"I'm good at breaking them in," Ugly Goon is boasting. His grin is wide and nasty and the most repulsive thing Matt's ever seen in his life. He doesn't hear the rest, sick with pain and disgust, is almost certain he vomits on one of those two evil fucks at that point. He can't decide if he hopes he got Ugly Goon's ugly face or Nesbitt's fucking expensive leather shoes more.

He remembers being hosed in cold water. Icy and _bruising_. Remembers Nesbitt laughing: "Been a while since I did this. But it's just like riding a bike, heh _Lieutenant?_ "

And curling up in a corner, in a trembling ball, cold and wet and naked.

Naked?

He's blind and tied to that fucking chair when Ugly Goon cuts opened the right leg of his jeans—completely terrified, in pain and _unable to see_ —he hyperventilates and nearly passes out.

He remembers wishing he'd had, later, even though by then it's obvious that not only he can't save himself, but that no one is coming to save him either.

He can't help but hope, anyway. Hope that someone found Kelly in time. Hope that Kelly didn't die like that—didn't die _like his dad_.

But no, Kelly can't be dead. He _can't_ be.

He remembers the first slash hurts _so much_. He can't swallow down the scream, and Ugly Goon laughs too, _gleefully_.

The second one hurts _more_. And the third one even more so—somehow, they all do, every single one, every single new slash is worse than the last.

 _That's not possible,_ he remembers thinking, _that shouldn't be possible_. Because the pain should dull, after a while, normally, it _should_.

But it doesn't. And Ugly Goon laughs, and keeps going, all the way down his leg, and Matt can't stop screaming even to try and breathe.

He remembers blindly gasping for air, with all those punches to his chest knocking him against the back of that fucking chair, remembers thinking he'll die of a punctured lung if they keep hitting his ribs, remembers gritting his teeth and wondering if he'll loose any and if he's lost any and _please not my head I don't want to die I don't want to leave Kelly—oh god Kelly please Kelly—_

He remembers the determined look on Kelly's face, right before he launches himself at the gun Nesbitt's fucking ugly, evil goon is aiming in Matt's direction. The bullet to his stomach doesn't actually stop him, but the one Ugly Goon fires nearly point-blank to his skull knocks him clear out. Matt _dives_ for him, and the coffee table _hurts_ as he falls against it, sharp edge against his back, but that doesn't matter because he falls cradling Kelly's head and thank god that's just an horrible graze and he's breathing and oh fuck his stomach, need to pack that wound, call 911—

Nesbitt's smashed their phones, under the heel of his fucking expensive leather shoes.

He remembers straightening Kelly on his back, pressing hard against the bleeding, frantically looking around for something he can use—

The kitchen towel is too far away. There's already blood on the couch cushion, and it's out of his reach too, anyway. It's ridiculously difficult to take off his jacket with one hand. His button-down shirt, even more so. His T-shirt would probably work better, but he doesn't have time to wriggle out of another layer, and he can only hope the buttons won't cause any more damage as he bundles them up inside the shirt and _pushes_ , doing his best to stop the bleeding and fervently hoping that's enough, because he needs tape and a phone and _help_ —

He should have screamed then. He remembers that. Remembers he doesn't, and they grab him and smother him before he can think of it.

And Kelly's bleeding out on the floor, unconscious, Katya's dead body on the couch, their phones destroyed, nobody to check up on them, and the fucking apartment complex is _soundproof_ because Gabby had liked that better than the little townhouse Matt had wanted, _where somebody would have heard the shots_.

He wants to live in a little townhouse _with Kelly_.

Close to the House, with a small backyard and a lot of locks on the doors.

A lot of locks. A lot of locks so no one can get in but the two of them.

He doesn't want to be naked with anyone but Kelly.

He never remembers passing out, but he remembers wanting to stay in the comforting, soothing darkness, remembers fighting to stay there rather than wake up in that chair to Ugly Goon's ugly face again, or Nesbitt's fakely compassionate eyes and disgusting leer, always too damn close.

He doesn't fucking _know_ where Katya's fucking notebook is.

"You shouldn't have fucking killed her, you ugly fuck," he remembers hearing himself say, like someone else is using his voice, all strange and _raw_. "Now you'll _never_ find it, and you'll fucking _rot in jail_ when the PD does."

" _Shut the fuck up_ ," Ugly Goon roars, shaking him by the throat again, "you dirty little _fag!_ "

"Easy, easy," he remembers Nesbitt soothing, through the rattling of his teeth and the ringing in his ears, "he's just being difficult." And: "—give him another dose, it's almost time anyway, it'll loosen him up."

He sees the needle this time, as it goes into his arm and injects him with _shit_. It doesn't matter how much he yells _nonotthatnopleaseno_.

He remembers trembling. _A lot_.

He remembers counting his breaths, his heartbeats, trying to will them down, calm himself. He remembers mostly failing. Trying again anyway.

He remembers having absolutely no sense of time. No sense of reality.

He remembers dreaming of Kelly.

Kelly saying _Shhh_ and _it's okay, sunshine, you're okay_ and _I'm here, it's okay_ and _you're safe, sunshine, you're safe_ , but it's not okay and he's not safe and he doesn't even know if Kelly's alive or not.

He thinks he remembers crying a little, in the choking darkness, or a lot, thinks he remembers screaming himself raw, wordlessly, and sobbing and pleading and praying, for Kelly to be alive and okay and safe.

He remembers Nesbitt laughing.

Matt's never hated anyone so much, in his entire life: Nesbitt and his laugh and his hands and his fucking hose.

His fucking _firehose_.

He remembers thinking he's never going to be able to look at a one of those again without shuddering, if he ever makes it out of there alive: it's _cold_ , and it hurts, and he can't _breathe_ , and he can't even curl up to protect himself, and _Nesbitt is laughing again_.

He remembers hands, too—way too many hands, hands that are _not Kelly's_ —roughly rubbing something on him, in his hair, on his face, stinging his eyes and burning his leg and pinning him down when he tries to escape, holding on too tight, and _moving him_ and _rubbing him_ and completely ignoring all his _no_ s and his _please_ s and his _let go_ s. Remembers cold, cold water, and wriggling and whimpering and trying to kick at least, blindly, and another prickle and everything going away again.

He's still tied the next (previous?) time he wakes up, and it takes him a while to realize it—and then comes the horrid awareness that his face feels clean-shaved and his clothes are _different_.

"—see what you mean," a voice is saying, and Matt squints blearily but can't make out a face with the light burning his eyes, can't focus properly with whatever shit's making him float fluffily. "He does clean up good. Doesn't look his age. He's kind of damaged, though."

"It'll heal," Nesbitt answers from behind him, too damn close, and then there's a fist in his hair, pulling his face up into the light even more, making him dizzy—he only catches part of what the fucking sick bastard is continuing with: "—eyes, and have you seen those lips?"

"They're cut," the voice snorts.

"Blame your man, he got rough," Nesbitt shoots back. "Come on, you know what I mean. He's blond, he's fit, and he's pretty—"

 _Pretty?_ Matt thinks, dizzy and fluffy. Pretty is a word Matt _hates_ to be called by. Pretty is his childhood and his whole damn teenage years and the worst of his dad, and that dark thing lurking in his head that always tries to convince him he's never good enough. He doesn't want to be _pretty_.

He'd rather be _sunshine_ : that's what Kelly calls him.

There's _hands_ on his face again, rough fingers digging into his jaw, trying to force him to unlock it, and he shakes his head desperately, thoughtlessly, unable to stop. He's dizzy and fluffy and he thinks he might be trembling too, and there's too many hands and he tries to bite instead but it only gets him harshly backhanded—and then his head is forcefully held in place and there's fingers prodding at his teeth even though he's clenching them so hard it hurts.

"Well, he's got all his teeth," the voice says, disgustingly amused, "but dammit, Jack, I wouldn't want a—"

All those hands abruptly let go and he pants through his nose, dizzy and fluffy and _terrified_ , jaw hurting and ears ringing, heart beating too damn loud, like it's echoing everywhere, like it's beating against the sides of his skull too.

"—got a nice, tight round—" he catches Nesbitt saying, from too damn close and a million miles away. And: "—if you don't have a buyer, _I'll_ keep him."

 _Keep him?_ Matt thinks, dizzy and fluffy and terrified and hurting everywhere. _Keep him?_

No, no, _no_. Only Kelly is allowed to keep him. _Only Kelly_.

He _screams_. Screams at them _all_ , Nesbitt and whoever's there crowding and appraising and _touching him_ —completely silently, voice just not working anymore, _what the fuck have those bastards done to him now?_ He screams _Let me go, you bastards_ and _You'll pay for this_ —and _Kelly! Kelly will kill you! He'll kill you!_ because at this point he doesn't care he can't make a sound, he's not really hanging to his sanity all that well and he remembers too vividly the look in Kelly's eyes as his little sister laid in that hospital bed, _after_ , all bruised and _broken_ , remembers Antonio saying _it's human trafficking_ and his father saying _what the fuck is a little fag like you ever going to be any good for_ and—and—

They prickle him, and he stops being again—escapes in the dark nothingness.

He remembers, fuzzily, some infinite time later—or maybe earlier?—Nesbitt holding his chin, too tight, tracing his cut lips with a finger, while Matt's panting and trying not to pass out and his eyesight is just _wrong_. Remembers hearing the _bastard_ say "I like you, Matt," and a memory in his brain, from another time, in the club: _I like you Matt_ , and him wondering, aloud, to Antonio—he thinks, or maybe Voight or Halstead or that guy who told him not to shave his chest on his account— _why me_ and _there's plenty of contractors in Chicago_ and that fancy gift basket and that horrible grin and _laughter_ and—

Nononononono. He doesn't remember anything else, because nothing else happened.

He thinks he might have bitten, though.

Fingers. He's bitten _fingers_. Nothing else.

Because nothing else _happened_. Right?

_Right?_

Because Matt only wants _Kelly_ , no one else can touch him, _no one else can keep him_ , no one, Kelly, no one—

"It's okay," he remembers Kelly whispering, rocking him, "it's okay sunshine, shhh." And "I'm here, I'm here, shhh, I'm here, sunshine, please, it's okay, it's okay."

There's something wrong with Matt's vision still, or maybe he doesn't remember things he should, but if it gets him Kelly then it's good but it'd be better if it was _real_ —

"Oh god Matt," Kelly rasps roughly against his hair, "I'm real, I swear, I'm real, you're safe now, it's okay, shhh, shhh, it's okay sunshine, it's okay."

He remembers another needle there, somewhere on the side, and Kelly's desperately worried face, right in front of him but half-hidden in white, with only one eye, saying "Shhh, Matt, it's okay sunshine, it's okay, it's okay," all over again and again from very far away, remembers the whole world trembling, and screaming and screaming and _screaming_.

He remembers screaming. He remembers sinking his teeth into flesh, thinking _the masseter muscle is the part of the human body able to exert the strongest crushing pressure_ , like he'd heard it or read it somewhere, and _you'll have to kill me first if you want me to fucking cooperate, you fucking disgusting piece of shit_.

There's yelling and punches and "Get him off, _get him off!_ " and fingers digging into his jaw and someone choking him, and it gets him yet another beating of course, but _that's better_ , and he's curled into the tightest little ball he can manage, eyes squished closed, ignoring the blood in his mouth and the cold air on his naked skin, thinking of nothing but _living for Kelly_. Forcing himself to gasp for breath in the shelter of his arms and his knees, through all the bursting, swimming bright lights and the _pain_ , because Kelly would never, ever want him to die no matter what, and no matter what Matt can't let him down. He _can't_.

And if he dies like this, this time, at least he'll die thinking of him.

But Kelly can't be dead. He _can't_ be.

"Who the fuck is Kelly, anyway?" he remembers Ugly Goon asking Nesbitt at one point, tone disgusted, throwing Matt's head backwards like Matt's nothing but an over-used rag doll. "The guy I killed in his apartment? I thought it was a _girl's_ name."

"It's gender-neutral," Nesbitt replies absently, taking Ugly Goon's chair in front of Matt and grabbing his chin to stare at his face in a way that makes Matt's skin _crawl_.

"Gender-neutral," Ugly Goon snorts revoltingly, "Sounds like a fag's name to me."

Nesbitt hums, like he's used to having these kinds of conversations—like he's used to _having conversations_ while _torturing people_.

Matt feels like liquid, burning jello, but he still has to will himself to _not_ think of who else must have sat in this fucking cold chair, and what else happened to them.

What else'll happen to him.

Was Katya here? Did she escape from here, hoping to find safety in Matt's apartment, only to find it empty, find she'd been followed there?

How did she even know where it was?

"The notebook, Matt," Nesbitt says, evenly, patiently, like he's got all the time in the world and can keep asking Matt that question for all eternity. "Where is it?"

"Safe," Matt croaks, because he doesn't know much but he knows _that_ much, and he doesn't want to stay here for all eternity.

"Funny," Nesbitt answers, and he actually _does_ look amused, "That's what Katya said too. In fact, it's the last thing she ever said."

Matt _glares_ at him, even though he's sure it's fucking laughable with how exhausted and tied up and bloody he is. " _Good_ ," he manages to spit out somewhat convincingly, "I'm not telling you either. You're _both_ going to rot in jail."

Nesbitt nods, like he's been expecting it. "She said that too, you know. Strong girl, I suppose. Not very bright though, or she wouldn't have done what she did." He smiles. "Do you want to tell him what she did?" he asks Ugly Goon, still not looking away from Matt.

"Little bitch spit in my face," Ugly Goon snarls, storming back near them, "so I gave her, how to say it? The sharpest fuck of her life," he grins, _horribly_ , holding up his hunting knife. "She cried like a little baby."

Nesbitt _laughs_.

Matt aims for his fucking expensive leather shoes this time.

It's worth the beating, to see them covered in vomit.

He doesn't want to think of how many girls Nesbitt must have sold to get those fucking things though—he doesn't want to think about Katya. He doesn't want to think at all.

He doesn't want to get _the sharpest fuck of his life_.

It's the only time he remembers passing out: he's _glad_ when he does.

He remembers screaming, and shaking, and people rushing around him. Trying to escape them, escape everything, and being completely unable to. Too much light, and too much white, too much noise and being restrained, _again_ , on his back like some kind of sacrificed _thing_.

And half of Kelly's worried face floating above him, saying _Matt_ and _Matt, please_ and _Sunshine_ and _it's okay, calm down, it's okay sunshine, it's okay_.

It's not, even if it gets all those people away from him. But Matt'll cling to anything he can—any part of Kelly he can, even strange hallucinations: nobody else's ever called him _sunshine_ , and he doesn't want anybody else to ever do.

If he dies, that word in Kelly's voice is the last thing he wants to hear, even if it just comes from somewhere in his own brain.

It's weird, though, that there's raindrops in this white place.

Raindrops—not a hose. Gentle quiet things.

From eyes?

Eye. With eyelashes. All stormy blue like a desperate, adoring sky.

He remembers drifting, looking for Kelly. Looking for his world.

Following rainclouds with little boat hats in an endless dark ocean, all bluegrey greyblue, steel and sweet smiles and overflowing love. Saying _Kelly, Kelly, Kelly_ like it's a magic word to make everything okay.

And Kelly's voice, shaky but unmistakable, answering _Sunshine, sunshine, sunshine_ , in a whisper Matt can almost feel.

He remembers waking up, several times: white ceiling tiles, blurry faces. Over and over.

His hand, cradled in both of Kelly's own, Kelly's lips against it, everything trembling a little still. Knowing it's Kelly by feel alone, opening his eyes to white ceiling tiles again, floatily turning his head to see, body all melted jello cloud.

Asking "Where's your eye?" and not hearing the answer, pulled back into fluffy nothingness.

He drifts and wakes up—he thinks—later—he _thinks_ —to Kelly cradling his hand (his right hand, right is not left), kissing his forehead and whispering: "That's it sunshine, wake up, let me see those gorgeous eyes of yours."

Matt blinks at him, uncomprehending, waiting for the puff of smoke: Kelly's blurry, and where his other eye should be is a patch of white. Like a fluffy cloud that's lost his hat.

"How'r'you feeling?" Kelly asks, voice thick with something.

"Your eye," Matt tries to say, but it sounds all broken and slurred and he frowns, squinting, feeling fluffy and stupid.

"You're safe," Kelly says, "you're in the hospital—they're in custody—you're safe."

 _But your eye_ , Matt tries to say, _what's wrong with your eye?_ But his throat hurts, burning as he tries to swallow to clear it, closing in, choking him like it'll never work again, and suddenly he's coughing desperately, whole body wrecked with it, completely unable to stop, and then there's hands on him—way too many hands on him, and another needle, and he's coughing and trying to scream _(no_ and _please_ and _no)_ but falling in darkness instead.

He wakes up again and Kelly is cradling his hand, again, like they're on repeat.

"Don't try to speak, sunshine," Kelly whispers, going off-track. "You're safe and I'm not going anywhere, okay?"

Matt nods, like a wobbly jellied thing, just trying to cling instead, as tightly as a wobbly jellied thing can. He drifts anyway.

He wakes up to Kelly's hands, gently stroking his cheek and massaging his hair, just behind his ear, like Matt's one of those cats he doodles sometimes, a fluffy thing he could make purr.

He probably could make Matt purr, if he was real.

"I'm real," Kelly says, voice somewhere between amused and heartbroken. "And I'll make you purr when you're better, sunshine."

 _You're the best hallucination_ , Matt thinks, and: _I love you, oh god Kel, I love you so much_ —

He wakes up to Kelly's face, peaceful in sleep right in front of him, warm breath gently caressing him, and stares: Kelly's left eye and part of the side of his head are covered by a white bandage, the skin all around it an explosion of almost purple little veins in a reddish-brownish-greenish bruised background, disappearing into hastily-shorn hair.

It had _looked_ like a graze. It hadn't hit his eye. He's _sure_ it hadn't hit his eye. Why is Matt imagining him like this?

Matt's lying sideways already, so he raises his other hand (right, right is not left, his heart is beating and his right leg feels weird and Kelly's on his other side from before) to brush, to trace, to feel, but his fingers are trembling, and suddenly he's afraid— _so, so afraid_ —that Kelly'll vanish if Matt tries to touch him, like that, on his own: dreams do that, don't they? Disappear into nothingness when you try to hold on?

He watches—watches him breathe, drinking him in, starved for him, barely daring to take any breath himself in case it accidentally makes him move his left hand even slightly, in case that too could take Kelly away, take away the warm fingers wrapped around his, the warm breath he can _feel_ —his warm love that can't be real. The bandage makes him feel sick, but he can't seem to will it away, and he just watches, and watches, helpless and breathless and miserable, as Kelly becomes blurry and blurry and blurry.

He thinks he sobs as he drifts, somewhere—but Kelly hugs him in his dreams.

He wakes up warm and safe in Kelly's arms, with his head tucked under Kelly's chin, breathing him in. He's cradled on his left side, all curled up into a ball, his fingers are clenched in Kelly's shirt, and _Kelly's breath is ruffling his hair_.

Do dream breathe?

Maybe Matt's not awake, after all.

He wakes up and Kelly's back in the chair, cradling his hand and watching him.

With just one eye.

The bandage makes Matt feel sick.

Literally, this time.

"Easy, easy," Kelly says, rubbing his back, holding him up, keeping him mostly on the bed as Matt pukes and pukes absolutely nothing at all, absently wondering if it's possible for someone to turn themselves inside out like that. "Easy, sunshine," Kelly soothes, "easy, you're okay, you're okay."

Matt squishes his eyes closed, because it's not fair, it's not fucking fair at all: Kelly's warm against him, he's _warm_ , and he's breathing against Matt's hair, and Matt's hurting all over, and any second now Nesbitt is going to turn his fucking hose on him and Kelly'll be gone, just gone, like anything normal and sane and safe, he'll be gone and Nesbitt'll be here again and Kelly'll be _gone_.

Gone and possibly _dead_.

There's a horrible wailing sound, his throat hurts and his head is splitting and he can't breathe—he can't _breathe_ —

It's quiet and Kelly is stroking his hair again, gently, softly, like Matt is some kind of fragile, skittish wild animal.

"Are you back with me?" he asks, like _Matt_ is the hallucination.

" _You_ are," Matt says.

That can't have been his own voice, this hoarse, painful _thing_.

He opens his eyes (they were closed—eyes have eyelids and eyelids have eyelashes) and Kelly is doing that sad half-smile again, looking at him with his one eye. "I never left," he whispers.

Which doesn't make any sort of sense, but he's warm again, in Matt's hair and under Matt's cheek, so that's okay: he's warm and everywhere.

"Can we stay here?" Matt asks, curling up even tighter, clinging to the part of Kelly that's under his cheek.

That hoarse, painful thing _is_ his voice, apparently. He doesn't like it.

But he likes the part of Kelly he's lying on: it's soft against his cheek, and it smells like him. And it's blue?

"Oh god Matt," Kelly whispers. And: "Yes, sunshine, we can stay here."

He keeps petting Matt's hair. Matt smiles against the blue Kelly thing.

He feels like he should know what it is, though.

It's like a leg, but it's blue. Kelly's legs aren't blue.

His eyes are blue.

His _eye_ is blue.

Don't people have two eyes? Aren't hallucinations people? It's not right that Kelly only has one eye.

He's getting all woozy again, but he manages to twist so he can squint up into Kelly's face.

"What happened to your other eye? _"_ he tries to say, but it comes out all mumbled, and Kelly is getting blurrier and blurrier.

The darkness is drowning him: he wakes up screaming Kelly's name, _pleading_ for him, and Kelly's arms are around him, instantly, like he's just materialized like that.

"What is it, sunshine," Kelly asks, rocking him, sounding close to tears himself as Matt sobs like a terrified child into his shoulder, all _Kelly, Kelly please, please Kelly please_ , completely unable to stop, "what do you want, what do you need?"

"You," Matt answers between body-shaking sobs, weakly, sniffling, lost and _needing_.

"You got me," Kelly says, fervently, "I told you, remember? You always got me, sunshine, _always_."

"Not _always_ ," Matt tries to explain, voice hoarse and painful and breaking on just about every syllable. And then he's rocking and shaking in Kelly's arms, clinging, croaking "Please don't be dead, please don't be dead, please Kelly _don't be dead_ Kelly please—" over and over again, _unable to stop_ , like those dreams of falling.

"I'm not," Kelly insists in his ear, breath warm and impossibly real, "god, Matt, _I'm not_."

He wakes up with a steady thumping in his ear—the beat is right, but the ear is not: when Kelly pulls him on his chest so Matt can hear his heart, so Matt can hear he's okay, and there, it's always on the other side. Matt's other side, and Kelly's other side: Matt's right side, Kelly's left, where his heart is.

The beat is right, and so's the scent, and those arms around him. But it's the wrong side.

"Kel?" he asks, barely daring to breathe it out, afraid to move even a tiny little bit—because what if it makes Kelly disappear?

Kelly moves, but he stays right here: just shifts, both him and Matt, until Matt can see his eyes. Eye.

"Hi gorgeous," he says, with a little smile, both of his hands around Matt's face, thumbs gently stroking his cheeks. All Matt can see, and feel, and smell.

"Hi handsome," he croaks. Because one eye or two or three or none, real or not, handsome is what Kelly will always be.

"D'you trust me?" Kelly asks, holding him still, and still not disappearing.

"Always," Matt whispers, immediately, not needing to think about such an easy question with such an obvious answer.

"Do you trust me to tell you the truth?" Kelly asks again.

"Of course," Matt answers. _That's_ obvious, too.

"Then trust me when I tell you I'm real," Kelly tells him, still holding him, and _still_ not disappearing. "I'm real, sunshine. I'm real, and you're safe."

Matt stares a little. He has the weird feeling maybe they've had that conversation before.

"...you're real?" he asks anyway, hushed, unsure. Wanting so badly to believe.

"I'm real," Kelly answers, gently, comfortingly, petting his hair.

Warm and breathing.

Warm and breathing is real, isn't it, if Kelly says so?

"Sleep," Kelly adds, softly. "I'll still be real when you wake up, sunshine, I promise."

It's not quite an order, not quite Kelly's master-voice, the one that can send him into, and pull him out of, anything. But Matt trusts him— _completely_. Trusts him with his life, his body, his heart. His sanity. (With his soul, his whole _being_.) So, obviously, he trusts him to be real when he says he is.

And Kelly's promised.

He holds on to Kelly and sleeps, Kelly's hands in his hair and Kelly's heart thumping steadily, reassuringly against his ear, like every beat is saying _I'm real, I'm real, I'm real_.

He still remembers when he wakes up. But he remembers Kelly's real, too. That Kelly's really there—banged up about as badly as Matt feels, but real and there and _alive_ , holding Matt's hand like a precious lifeline (a precious lifeline for them both), kissing his forehead and his cheeks, his lips and both his hands. Calling him _sunshine_ and saying _it's okay_ like he can _make_ it so by sheer force of will, by saying it enough times. (Enough times to make Matt believe him, maybe.)

He still remembers, and _he has to talk about it_ , and go through a whole battery of tests and a whole battery of shots—but Kelly's _there_. Real, warm, and _alive_.

Ultimately, that's all Matt cares about.


End file.
